The ability for an advertiser to convey an advertising message to television viewers is hindered when the television viewer is using a digital video recorder (DVR) or a video on demand and opts to fast forward through the commercial break where the commercial of the advertiser is located. While fast forwarding, the viewer typically sees only bits and pieces of any given commercial during the commercial break, and the audio is typically muted altogether. Therefore, the value of the commercial break to the advertiser may be greatly diminished.
There have been efforts to address this issue. For instance, alternative commercial content may be displayed by the DVR on the same display device where the commercial break is being fast forwarded either as an overlay or as a total replacement. As a more drastic alternative, there have been proposals to block the fast forward function at least during the playback of certain content or commercials. In either case, the television viewer may not be satisfied, either with the alteration of the content being shown on the display device during fast forwarding or with the prevention of fast forwarding altogether.